Children’s Spanish subject pronoun expression
A developmental change in tú?
This study explores children’s acquisition of structured morphosyntactic variation by examining Spanish subject pronoun expression. Analyses of 5,923 verbs produced by 154 Mexican children, ages 6 to 16, show that the variables that most strongly constrain the oldest children’s pronoun usage – Person, Reference, Priming – are acquired first during childhood. These variables exert similar effects across age, with the exception of second-person singular, which favors tú expression among younger children and tú omission among older children. The developmental trajectory from more to less tú expression is explained as the result of (a) increasing production of nonspecific reference, which in turn decreases rates of tú, and (b) abundant reported speech in the younger children’s data, which rendered tú expression pragmatically appropriate.
References
Bayley, R., & Pease-Álvarez, L
(
1997)
Null pronoun variation in Mexican-descent children’s narrative discourse.
Language variation and change, 9, 349-371.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Bel, A
(
2003)
The syntax of subjects in the acquisition of Spanish and Catalan.
Probus, 15, 1-23.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Brown, R.W., & Bellugi, U
(
1964)
Three processes in the child’s acquisition of syntax.
Harvard Educational Review, 34, 133-151.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Brown, P., & Levinson, S
(
1987)
Politeness: Some universals in language usage. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Cameron, R
(
1993)
Ambiguous agreement, functional compensation, and nonspecific tú in the Spanish of San Juan, Puerto Rico, and Madrid, Spain.
Language Variation and Change, 5, 305-334.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Carvalho, A., Orozco, R., & Shin, N.L
(
2015)
Introduction. In
A. Carvalho,
R. Orozco, &
N.L. Shin (Eds.),
Subject pronoun expression in Spanish: A cross-dialectal perspective (pp. xiii-xxx). Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Davidson, B
(
1996)
‘Pragmatic weight’ and Spanish subject pronouns: The pragmatic and discourse Uses of ‘tú’ and ‘yo’ in spoken Madrid Spanish.
Journal of Pragmatics, 26(4), 543-565.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Grinstead, J
(
2010)
Linguistic interfaces and child Spanish. In
L. Domínguez &
P. Guijarro-Fuentes (Eds.),
Proceedings of the Romance Turn 3 (pp. 189-218). Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Johnson, D.E
(
2009)
Getting off the GoldVarb standard: Introducing Rbrul for mixed-effects variable rule analysis.
Language and Linguistics Compass, 3(1), 359-383.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Labov, W
(
1994)
Principles of linguistic change: Internal factors. Oxford: Blackwell.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Lastra, Y., & Martín Butragueño, P
(
2015)
Subject pronoun expression in oral Mexican Spanish. In
A. Carvalho,
R. Orozco, &
N.L. Shin (Eds.),
Subject pronoun expression in Spanish: A cross-dialectal perspective (pp. 41-60). Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Michnowicz, J
(
2015)
Subject pronoun expression in contact with Maya in Yucatan Spanish. In
A. Carvalho,
R. Orozco, &
N.L. Shin (Eds.),
Subject pronoun expression in Spanish: A cross-dialectal perspective (pp. 103-122). Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Otheguy, R., & Zentella, A.C
(
2012)
Spanish in New York: Language contact, dialectal leveling, and structural continuity. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Otheguy, R, Zentella, A.C., & Livert, D
Raña Risso, Rocío
2013 A corpus-based sociolinguistic study of subject pronoun placement in New York City (Unpublished PhD dissertation). CUNY Graduate Center, New York.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Shin, N.L
(
2015)
Acquiring patterns of morphosyntactic variation: Children’s Spanish subject pronoun expression.
Journal of Child Language. Retrieved from:
[URL] ![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Shin, N.L., & Erker, D
(
2015)
The emergence of structured variability in morphosyntax: Childhood acquisition of Spanish subject pronouns In
A. Carvalho,
R. Orozco, &
N.L. Shin (Eds.),
Subject pronoun expression in Spanish: A cross-dialectal perspective (pp. 171-192). Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Shin, N.L., & Otheguy, R
(
2013)
Social class and gender impacting change in bilingual settings: Spanish subject pronoun use in New York.
Language in Society, 42(4), 429-452.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Silva-Corvalán, C
(
2014)
Bilingual language acquisition: Spanish and English in the first six years. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Solomon, J
(
1999)
Phonological and syntactic variation in the Spanish of Valladolid, Yucatán (Unpublished PhD dissertation). Stanford University, CA.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Stewart, M
(
2003)
‘Pragmatic weight’ and face: Pronominal presence and the case of the Spanish second person singular subject pronoun tú
.
Journal of Pragmatics, 35(2), 191-206.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Szmrecsanyi, B
(
2005)
Language users as creatures of habit: A corpus-based analysis of persistence in spoken English.
Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory, 1, 113-149.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Torres Cacoullos, R., & Travis, C.E
(
2011)
Testing convergence via code-switching: Priming and the structure of variable subject expression.
International Journal of Bilingualism, 15(3), 241-267.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Villa-García, J
(
2013)
On the role of children’s deterministic learning in the ‘no-overt-subject’ stage in the L1 acquisition of Spanish. In
C. Cathcart,
I-H. Chen, G. Finley,
S. Kang,
C.S. Sandy, &
E. Stickles (Eds.),
Proceedings of the 37th Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society (pp. 375-388). Berkeley, CA: Berkeley Linguistics Society.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Cited by
Cited by 1 other publications
DATTNER, Elitzur & Dorit RAVID
2023.
The development of Hebrew zero and pronominal subject realization in the context of first and second person.
Journal of Child Language ► pp. 1 ff.
![DOI logo](//benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 24 june 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers.
Any errors therein should be reported to them.